Do you ever feel a little awkward when you’re trying to steer your surfboard and carve up the waves?Do you ever take a hard bottom turn or try to make a sharp pivotal turn off the lip and fall off your board? If so, here’s a simple tip and easy technique to follow.

First, make sure you are comfortable with the basics in our Learn How To Surf Guide, once you've got those down, you're ready to move on to turning. If you’re regular foot, use your left hands to guide you.If you’re a goofy foot, use your right hand to guide you.Think of your hands as your steering wheels.Your surfboard will generally go in the direction you point your hands.By extending your arms and swinging it to the direction that you want to go, it forces you to turn your shoulders and hips, lean into your rails, and shift your weight to your back foot while keeping you balanced.This will give you much better control over your board.Once you’re comfortable doing this, swing your arms from one side to the other when you’re going from rail to rail as you’re carving up and down the face of the wave.Also don’t forget to bend your knees to get a lower center of gravity when you’re leaning hard.As you gain more speed, you’ll notice you can lean more and more into your turns allowing you to make bigger pivotal turns.Start using your back feet to push hard into the turns and you’ll feel the fins engage and even spray an extra bucket of water.

If you’re not already doing this, try it and you’ll feel much more balanced on hard turns.It’s sure to put a huge smile on your face.Plus you won’t look like such a stiff on your board.